


Don't Stop Me Now

by lostangelssong



Series: Weird Grandpa Big Boss [3]
Category: Metal Gear
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Crack, Cute Kids, Gen, M/M, Metal Gear?!, Not Canon Compliant, Smoking, Sorry Not Sorry, Swearing, Twins, Weird Grandpa Big Boss, action kids!, sneaking mission
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-05
Updated: 2018-04-06
Packaged: 2018-08-19 15:04:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8213471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lostangelssong/pseuds/lostangelssong
Summary: Four years after Big Boss's Road Trip to rescue the twins, and everything is great....Until Ocelot shows up.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So, this has already gone in a suitably different direction from Canon.  
> David Bowie songs are out. Queen is in.  
> I am so not sorry for this. More tags/characters will be added as needed.

It was hot.  The speakers were blaring some tinny song about some place called Funkytown, wherever _that_ was.  Uncle Beef must have been in the radio room again.

And there was a cowboy on the deck. 

David had never seen him before.  He was perched behind some crates, aiming a tranquilizer pistol at the cowboy.  Who _was_ he?  And how had he gotten all the way onto Mother Base?  Both of these were really good questions.  And while Mom might _kill_ him if she found out that he was using the tranquilizer gun (again), Dad would probably want to know about this guy. 

“David!  What are you doing?!”

“Go away, Eli.  You’re distracting me,” David muttered.  At least Eli was behind him and whispering, so he wasn’t in the _middle_ of his shot.

“Who’s the weird cowboy?  Do you think he’s from the other MSF?”

David sighed, looking over at his twin.  “It’s called _Doctors_ without Borders, Eli.  Not _Cowboys_ without Borders.  I don’t think he’s with _either_ MSF.”

“Do you think Uncle Kaz knows about him?”

David glared at his twin, and wishing that not shooting at friends (or irritating twin brothers) hadn’t been the first safety precaution that Dad had drilled into them when he had agreed to teach them to shoot.

“I don’t know, maybe you should go ask him.  If he doesn’t, I’m sure he _will_ with as many questions as you’re asking,” David said, frowning. 

“Do you think _Dad_ knows about him?”

“I think if Dad knew about him, he wouldn’t be snooping around on the deck,” David said, raising the tranq gun again.

“Where’d you get that gun?” Eli asked.

“Dad’s stuff,” David said. 

“Do you think he has another one?  I want one too!” Eli said, moving so he was next to David.  Still out of the way of the shot though. 

“Maybe you could ask him,” David said. 

“You should shoot the cowboy in the butt!” Eli suggested.

“Why the butt?” David asked, though he did start to giggle maybe a little.

“Because it would be _funny_.  Besides, he’s facing the other way, so you could totally hit him in the butt.”

A couple of things happened then.  David aimed and took a shot at the cowboy, and he turned around, at the same moment, spotting the two boys.  He drew a gun and shot the tranq round out of the air.  And then he just was left _staring_ at the boys.

“Hey!  You aren’t supposed to be able to do that!  That’s cheating!” Eli yelled, finally breaking the silence.

The cowboy was still staring, but his gaze turned to something like surprise. 

“You’re the twins!” he proclaimed.

David looked at his brother then.

“Eli, I think that we need to go get Dad or Uncle Kaz.  _Now_.”

“What about Mom?” Eli asked.

“She might kill me for trying to shoot the cowboy in the butt,” David said, frowning.

“But it was _funny_!” Eli protested.

David sighed, grabbed Eli’s hand, and dragged his brother off to go find their Dad, leaving the Weird Cowboy alone on the deck.

Big Boss, thankfully, wasn’t hard to find.  He was in the briefing room with Kaz, discussing missions and potential new contracts when the boys burst into the room. 

“Boys?  What’s wrong?”

“Dad, there’s a cowboy out on the deck,” David said.

“We tried to shoot him in the butt!” Eli proclaimed.

“Yeah, but he shot it out of the air,” David said, clearly disappointed.

“He’s not allowed to do that!  It’s cheating!” Eli added.

“He also seemed to know who we were,” David said.  “But we’ve never seen him before.”

Big Boss sighed.  “Slow down you two.  You must be worked up if you’re doing that finishing each other’s sentences thing.   So let me get this straight.  There’s a cowboy.  Up on the deck.  That you tried to shoot.”

“In the butt!”

“Yes, Eli.  You made that clear.  What were you shooting at him with?  And does your Mom know about our visitor?”

“I found a gun that fires sleep darts in your stuff!” David said, grinning and looking quite proud of himself.

“Mom doesn’t know.  She’d be mad.”

“You’re right Eli.  She probably would.  Mostly because I taught you two how to shoot in the first place,” Big Boss agreed.  “Kaz, keep an eye on the boys.  I’m gonna go check out this cowboy of theirs.”

“Sure, Boss.  Be careful,” Kaz said. 

“I will.”

That said, Big Boss got up, ruffled the boys’ hair, and headed out towards the deck.  Getting there put him face to face with the mysterious cowboy that the kids had tried to shoot.  The cowboy that seemed to know the boys.  That was worrisome.

“You know, if you wanted to join MSF, there are easier ways to do it,” Big Boss said to the stranger.

“I didn’t expect you to have the Twins,” the cowboy said.

That voice.  He _knew_ that voice.  And Big Boss looked at the cowboy sideways. 

“Ocelot?  What the hell happened to you?”

“What do you mean?”

Big Boss sighed.  “You look _old_.”

“People _do_ age, John,” Ocelot said.

Big Boss’s eye narrowed.  “Don’t call me that.”

“But it’s your name.”

“Cut the bullshit, Ocelot.  Why are you here?  If you’re here as some sort of agent for Zero, you can save your breath and leave.”

“I’m not here because of Zero,” Ocelot said.  “I came for my own reasons.”

“You care to share what those are?” Big Boss asked.

“I actually came because of the Twins,” Ocelot said.

“What about the twins?” Big Boss growled, his eye narrowing.  He didn’t like where this conversation was going.  He _hadn’t_ liked where it was going since Ocelot showed up.

“It seems that your friend, Dr. Clark, tinkered with the boys’ genes.”

“Meaning _what_?” Big Boss was getting closer and closer to shooting Ocelot, but this sounded important, so he would wait until Ocelot stopped beating around the bush and hear what he had to say first.

“She built an expiration timer into them.  They’ll age and die faster than most people.  From my understanding, it will look a lot like Werner’s syndrome,” Ocelot explained.

“Is it reversible?” Big Boss asked.

“Probably.  It hasn’t developed yet.  I don’t know everything, but I know that it’s on some kind of built in genetic timer, set to activate when the twins reach a certain age.”

“Well, if Dr. Clark did it, then she’s going to _undo_ it.”  This was growled. 

“I would like to offer you my services and—“

Ocelot didn’t finish.  He looked surprised, before he slumped to the ground, unconscious.  Big Boss growled, looking around, and sighing a little when he saw David and Eli high-fiving each other from a pair of nearby crates.  David had the tranq pistol.  And Kaz was standing behind the boys, grinning.

“Kaz!” he groaned, looking at his second in command.  “I thought I told you—“

“What?  I was watching them,” Kaz said smugly. 

“Dad, I shot him in the butt!” David proclaimed, grinning.

Big Boss shook his head, fighting with laughter.  “That you did, David.  Come on.  Let’s go inside and get you boys something to eat to celebrate your success.”

“What about Uncle Kaz?” Eli asked.

“Uncle Kaz can come too.  After he deposits our cowboy friend in the brig.” 

That said, he led the boys inside, expecting Kaz to deal with Ocelot.  This was a mess.  But one thing had suddenly become very clear.  He had to find Para-Medic, and bring her back to Mother Base with extreme prejudice.  He’d organize that op ASAP.  But after lunch.  Sneaking missions couldn’t be accomplished on an empty stomach, after all.


	2. Chapter 2

Big Boss sat in the plane, looking over the mission briefing for what had to be at least the third time.  The goal was to find Dr. Clark.  She didn’t seem to have any current affiliation with Zero, so there was _that_ at least.  But she was still the only person that could fix whatever was going on with the boys.  Doberman and Hedgehog were great medics, but that was more for stitching, surgery, and trauma work.  None of the medics on Mother Base knew anything about gene therapy.

Finding Dr. Clark would be doable.  And then the plan was to bring her back to Mother Base with extreme prejudice.  She _would_ undo whatever weird genetic timer she had coded into the boys.  No other answer was acceptable.

On this mission was a small team of his people, and Ocelot.  Ocelot had insisted on going along, and had refused to provide what intelligence he had unless he had been taken along on the mission.  Big Boss had reluctantly agreed, even though it had caused a _lovely_ discussion between him and Kaz.  Doberman had come, as had Beef and Alligator.  Ocelot had provided what information that he could.  So now all that was left was to infiltrate the facility where Dr. Clark was.  She had left the CIA, and was working for a biotech company called ATGC in California.  Big Boss remembered the name.  They had been in charge of the Les Enfants Terribles project.

It should be a relatively easy—

Snake was pulled out his thoughts, and his looking over the briefing information, by some rustling in the back. 

“What was that?” he asked, getting to his feet.

“What was what, Boss?” Beef asked.

Big Boss paused, but then there was the rustling, and something that sounded like scuffling. 

“ _That_ ,” he said.  “You can’t say you didn’t hear it, Beef.  I’m going back to check out what it is.”

“Do you want backup, sir?” Beef asked.

“No, Beef.  I think I can handle this,” Big Boss said, rolling his eye.

He headed into the back.  There were some crates, and that’s where the rustling and scuffling sounded like it was coming from.  The crates were covered with a sheet.  He pulled aside the sheet only to find the twins crouched in one of the crates. 

“I told you that you were making too much noise, Eli,” David said, climbing out of the crate that they had been hiding in.

“But I was hungry!  And _bored_!” Eli protested.

“What are you two doing here?”  Big Boss asked. 

“We wanted to come,” David said.

“We didn’t know the ride would be so _long_ ,” Eli added.

Big Boss sighed, closed his eye, and counted to ten.  They were too far along in the flight to turn around and take the boys back to Mother Base after all.  He was _not_ telling EVA about this if he could manage it.  Finally, he opened his eye, and looked at the twins.

“Well, you get passing marks for infiltration.  But your stealth could use a lot of work. You got caught.  You know what happens if you get caught?”

“You’re dead,” David said.  “We _wouldn’t_ have gotten caught if Eli wasn’t so loud.”

“Don’t blame this on me!  You were talking about how you were hungry too!” Eli protested.

“Enough. Come on.  You two might as well stop hiding in the crates.  We’ll see what we can do about getting you food,” Big Boss said.  Then he paused, looking at the twins sideways.  “Does Kaz know where you are?”

“We mentioned we were going on an infiltration mission,” David said after a moment.

“We told him before he’d had coffee.  He said it was fine!” Eli said, grinning.

The MSF commander sighed again.  Kaz was _not_ a morning person.  It was how the twins had gotten him to agree to any number of things over the last several years.  Some of them more… interesting than others.  It was also why the twins were half-fluent in Japanese, because of him putting them in front of those weird Japanese cartoons (like the one with the creepy smiling panda) to get them to leave him alone or to stop them from getting into trouble.

“Check, which means he’s probably running around, freaking out, and looking for you.”

“Probably!” Eli agreed, cheerfully.

“Come on.  Let’s get you terrors something to eat.  And I can call Kaz and talk him down from a heart attack.”

“Dad, where are we going?” David asked, as they walked towards the front levels of the plane.

“On a mission, David.”

“Why did you take the weird cowboy along?” Eli asked.

Big Boss sighed again.  “Because he has information I need.  And he wouldn’t give it to me unless I brought him.”

“So… does that mean that if we have information you need, you’ll actually take us along on missions?” David asked after a few moments.

“Maybe when you two are old enough to drive, we’ll consider it,” Big Boss said. 

He led the twins to the front of the plane.  “Beef!  Watch the twins.  Get them something to eat.  Don’t let our… new associate bug them.  I’m going to the cockpit to put in a call back to base.”

“Yes sir!” Beef said, saluting. 

Big Boss just rolled his eye, and headed to the cockpit. 

Once he was gone, David and Eli looked at each other.  Beef sighed.  Since a look like that generally meant that mayhem would be happening soon. 

“Uncle Beef, we’re _really_ hungry,” Eli began.

“We haven’t had anything to eat for hours.  And rations are gross,” David chimed in.

“All right.  All right.  I’ll go get you two food.  But… _please_ don’t get into trouble!” Beef said plaintively, before he headed out to find something for the twins to eat.

Eli and David grinned at each other.  Just because Dad had said that the cowboy wasn’t allowed to bother _them_ , didn’t mean that they weren’t allowed to bother _him_.

“Are you really a cowboy?” Eli asked Ocelot.

“Not exactly,” Ocelot said, eyeing the twins warily.

“You look like a cowboy,” David pointed out.

“Where’d you learn to shoot like that?  That’s cheating, you know!” Eli proclaimed, scowling at Ocelot.

“How did you know who we were?” David asked. 

“I know your father,” Ocelot said, not really answering the question.

“Well he never mentioned you,” Eli said. 

“Yeah.  I think that he would have told us about a cheating cowboy,” David said.

Ocelot _sighed_.  He hadn’t expected the twins to be so annoying. 

“How’d you find our base?” Eli asked.

Thankfully, Ocelot was spared from answering by Big Boss coming back in.  He looked tired.  And he saw the twins had parked themselves in front of Ocelot, and sighed. 

“Come here you two.  I don’t need you causing trouble.  Where’s Beef?”

“He went to get us food!” Eli proclaimed.

“We were practicing interrogation,” David said, smiling.

“I think you two have interrogated Ocelot enough for now.  You can try again later.”

“Dad, why are we going on a mission?” David asked.

Big Boss looked at the twins, seriously.  He knew that he had to have this conversation with them.  He was trying to figure out how. 

“Ocelot gave me some intelligence.  He said that you two could get very sick,” he began.  “I was going to find a doctor to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

“But couldn’t Doberman or Hedgehog make us better?” Eli asked.

“It’s not that kind of sickness.  You’re going to need a special kind of doctor,” Big Boss explained.

“I don’t feel sick,” David said.

“Me neither!” Eli added.

“I know.  But we’re going to take you to the doctor to make sure that you _don’t_ get sick.  And this is a sneaking mission.  All equipment is procure-on-sight.  Even the target.”

“Does that mean we’re kidnapping a doctor?” David asked after a moment.

“Maybe,” Big Boss said. 

Right about then, Beef got back with the food.  The twins set upon it like hungry wolves.  Big Boss watched them eat.  The twins coming along had been unexpected.  But if he could get them to stay on the plane while he procured Dr. Clark, then the twins might actually be an advantage in this mission.  After all, he was fairly sure that Dr. Clark had to have a heart _somewhere_ inside her.  If he could set the twins on her, asking her to fix them, it might make the whole thing a bit easier.

Big Boss honestly didn’t think things would be that easy, but he had to try.  Now all they needed to do was to get to California, and they’d see what kind of clusterfuck was waiting for them there.


	3. Chapter 3

“This is _boring_ ,” Eli complained for what had to be the fifth time in as many minutes.

“I know,” David said, looking distractedly at one of the maps.

The twins had currently parked themselves in the cockpit of the plane.  Big Boss and the others had gone to infiltrate the facility, leaving the twins on the plane, with only Doberman to look after them.  Big Boss had figured that was the best idea.

“Eli… I have an idea,” David finally said. 

He turned then, grabbing one of the maps, and a walkie-talkie.  He also made sure that he had the tranq pistol, which he had brought with him from Mother Base.

“David, what are you doing?”

“So, I figured we can work this like Dad and Uncle Kaz do.  I can go on the sneaking mission inside the base, and you can provide me support from here,” David explained.

“I want to go too!” Eli protested

“You’re _loud_.  You’ll get us caught.  Besides, I’m gonna need someone to help me navigate.”

“Well then, I’ll keep the map.  How am I supposed to navigate you if I don’t know where you’re going to be?” Eli asked, taking the maps back.

“Fine.  Those maps are hard to read anyway,” David said, rolling his eyes.

“How are you going to get in?” Eli asked.

David frowned.  His brother had a point.  Then his face lit up.

“It’s a _sneaking mission_ , remember? I’ll just get in the way that Dad, the cowboy, Beef, and Alligator went.”

Eli frowned.  “Just don’t get caught, okay?  Remember what Dad says about getting caught during a sneaking mission.”

“Yeah, yeah.  If you get caught, you’re dead.  I know.  But I’m smaller than Dad.  I won’t get caught.”

“Be careful, David,” Eli said.  “I can’t really do much if I’m on the plane.”

“It’ll be okay,” David said, handing Eli the walkie-talkie that matched his.  “Here.  We can stay in touch through these.”

“I’ll distract Doberman so you can get off the plane,” Eli said. 

“All right!  We’ve got a plan!” David said, grinning.

“Yep!  Call me once you’re inside!” Eli said, before taking off to distract Doberman.  He figured he’d ask the medic for food.  Food was _always_ a good distraction, and the Twins were _always_ hungry, so it worked out.

David took that opportunity to sneak off of the plane.  He figured that it would be easy to get in and he was right.  It didn’t look like his Dad and the others had gone through the front door, but David had been watching where they went in – a small side entrance, which no one was guarding.  So it wasn’t difficult to sneak in.  Once he was in, and there was no one in the halls, he called Eli with the walkie-talkie.

“Eli?”

“Are you in?” Eli asked.  The signal was staticky, but it wasn’t too bad.

“Yeah.  Dad said they were looking for a doctor, remember?  Is there anywhere on the maps that looks like a doctor’s office?” David asked.

There was rustling as Eli looked through the maps.  “Um… Maybe?” Eli said.  “These maps are _awful!_ ”

David sighed.  “Come on, Eli!  I need your help,” he hissed at the radio.

“Um… well, there’s a lab down on what looks like floor B… 5?” Eli replied.  “That sounds like a Battleship coordinate.”

“Well, I’m gonna try to find an elevator.”

“Taking the stairs might be better!” Eli pointed out.  “You can see what’s coming on the stairs.  That’s not so true on the elevator.”

David paused, before sighing.  “Yeah, there could end up being bad guys in the elevator, like in that one James Bond movie.  And this is a sneaking mission.  B5?”

“Yep.  There should be stairs not far from where you are,” Eli said, looking at the maps again.  He’d been able to see where David had entered the building, after all.

“All right.  I’m going to find them and start heading down,” David said.  “I’ll be in touch.”

That said, he put the walkie-talkie back on his belt.  He saw the stairs.  If he was lucky, they would take him all the way down.  If he was lucky, he wouldn’t get caught, and Dad wouldn’t even know about this sneaking mission.

It turned out, he wasn’t so lucky.  When David reached the bottom of the stairs, a lady ran into him.  She hadn’t been looking where she was going, and she just _plowed_ into the eight year old.  David yelped in surprise, and then winced as the tranq gun (which he had out just in case) went off.   The woman looked at him in surprise, before slumping over.

“Oh no!  Don’t be dead!” David cried, before going over to get a better look at the lady that he shot.

She was maybe the same age as Dad, it was hard to tell.  She had shoulder length red hair, which had small streaks of gray going through it.  But she was still _breathing_ , so that was good.  David noticed that the tranquilizer dart had hit her in the thigh.  That wasn’t good, but it was better than hitting her in the chest or the eye or something.

Sighing, David grabbed the walkie-talkie and called his twin.

“Eli?”

“Yeah?  What happened?”

“I shot a lady.”

“You _what_?  David!”

“She ran right into me!  It was an accident!  She’s just sleeping,” David said, looking at the prone woman.  “She’ll be okay.  I think, anyway.”

“Who is she?” Eli asked. 

“Um… oh wait, she has an ID badge around her neck,” David said, noticing it.  “Wow, this must be an old picture.  It’s just a picture and it says Clark on it in all capital letters.  There’s a barcode on it too.”

There was rustling of papers on the other end of the walkie-talkie for a moment.  And then Eli was back on the line.  “Did you say Clark?  The lady that Dad was looking for is named Clark!  Dr. Clark.  There’s a whole bunch of other aliases on here too.”

“Well now what?  I can’t really drag her out of here by myself.  I’d be caught for sure.”

“You might have to call Dad,” Eli said, after a moment.

“What?  I don’t even know where he is!”

“You have a walkie-talkie.  You could call him.  Duh,” Eli said, and even though David couldn’t see him, he knew that his brother was rolling his eyes.

“What’s the frequency then, genius?” David growled.

Eli rattled it off, and David tuned the walkie, before trying it. 

“Um…  Boss?” he tried.  This was a _mission_ after all, so their Dad would be in Big Boss mode.

The response was quick.  “David?  What the hell are you doing on the radio?!”

“Call me Snake.  I’m _working_ ,” David shot back.

There was an audible sigh, before Big Boss tried again.  “I thought you and your brother were on the plane.”

“We got bored!” this came from Eli, who cut in.

“Isn’t Doberman watching you?” Big Boss asked.  He didn’t like how this conversation was going.

“Doberman’s not our Dad.  Besides… he’s taking a nap,” Eli said, grinning, though it went unseen.

There was a pause, as Big Boss counted to ten.  Then he sighed.  “Are both of you in the facility?”

“Nope.  Just me,” David said.  “Dad, er, Boss, I found the lady that you were looking for?”

“The lady?”

“The lady _doctor_.  You know, Doctor Clark or whatever.  She’s taking a nap now too.”

“I have got to get that tranq pistol away from the two of you,” Big Boss muttered.  “All right.  Where are you?”

“Ummm…”

“If he went down the steps, he’s on B3,” Eli cut in.  “Dad, these maps are awful!”

“They were the best we could get on short notice.  We’ll be back on the plane soon.  David, stay where you are and try not to be seen.”

“All right.  Should I shoot her again if she starts to wake up?” David asked.

“No.  I’ll be there soon.”

He cut the communication then, and headed to find his son.  When he found David, the little boy was still holding a gun on Dr. Clark, who seemed like she was slowly coming around, groaning. 

Apparently, running hadn’t been such a good idea.  Consciousness came rushing back, and she opened her eyes, before seeing something unnerving.  Snake was there, standing behind a little boy that looked a _lot_ like him.  And the little boy had a gun trained on her.

“Hi Para-Medic.  You’re coming with us.” 

This came from Snake.  And she groaned, closing her eyes.  Today was not her day.  And she had a feeling that things were only going to get worse from here.


	4. Chapter 4

“Do you hear anything?” Eli asked, as he looked around.

“Nothing.  I didn’t think this dumb door would be so _thick,_ ” David said, making a face, and shifting a little to try to hear _something_.

“What _are_ you two doing?” 

That question came from their Uncle Kaz, who had just walked around the corner, and stopped when he saw Eli looking around, and David standing near the briefing room door with a stethoscope pressed against it.

“We’re trying to gather intelligence,” David said without missing a beat, before shifting the stethoscope again. 

“You need to work on your stealth,” Kaz said.

“Well, Eli was _supposed_ to be the lookout,” David said, making a face.

“I was being lookout!  Uncle Kaz is on our side!” Eli protested.

Kaz sighed a little and looked at the twins.  He had heard all about their grand adventure helping the Boss procure Dr. Clark.  And of course, after they had all gotten home from that fiasco, some of the men had started calling the twins “the Twin Snakes” again.  And if the boys weren’t careful, that codename would _stick_.

“Well, lookout or not, you’re going to get caught if you’re doing something as obvious as trying to listen in with a stethoscope in the middle of the hallway,” Kaz said, folding his arms.

“So what do you think we should do, Uncle Kaz?” Eli asked. 

“Yeah.  I mean, I’m surprised you aren’t in there with Dad, the doctor, and the cowboy,” David said.

Kaz scowled a little at that news.  “The cowboy’s in there too?”

“Yeah.  David was going to try to shoot him in the butt again, but we couldn’t get a good angle before he went into the briefing room with Dad,” Eli supplied, helpfully.

“Well, come on you two.  If you want to know what’s going on in the briefing room, we’re going to have to get a better vantage point.  You aren’t going to learn anything by trying to listen to the door with a stethoscope,” Kaz pointed out.  “By the way, does Hedgehog know that you two raided Medical?”

“She _gave_ us the stethoscope,” David said. 

“But she said that we’d regret it if we didn’t bring it back.  Hedgehog is scary,” Eli stated.

“Of course she is.  You don’t mess with medics,” Kaz said, shrugging.  Then he turned to go.

“Where are you going?” David asked.

“I told you.  If you want to know what’s going on, we’re going to have to get a better vantage point,” Kaz reminded him, before heading off, with the twins on his heels.

It didn’t take them long to get to their destination – the communications room.  As Boss had pointed out (more than once), it was next to impossible to get any privacy on Mother Base.  The walls had ears.  Sometimes literally.  And once the boys were settled, he cued up the audio feed for the briefing room.  He also got the cameras working so that they could see what was going on.

“There’s cameras in the briefing room?” Eli asked.

“There’s cameras _everywhere_ in Mother Base, Eli,” David said, rolling his eyes.

Big Boss, meanwhile, was blessedly oblivious to the fact that he was being watched by Kaz and the twins.  And he slammed his fist down on the table in front of Para-Medic.

“You did this!  So you can _undo_ it!” he growled. 

“Snake, gene therapy doesn’t always work that way,” Dr. Clark said, her eyes scanning the room for exits, and finding none.  Then she started coughing when Big Boss blew out some smoke from his cigar agitatedly.

“You know, smoking is bad for you,” she said.

“I don’t give a shit.  Not fixing my kids is going to be bad for _you_ ,” Big Boss countered.

“I thought you weren’t interested in them.  That’s why you left the project,” Dr. Clark said.

“Things change, in case you didn’t realize.  It’s been years since that happened.”

“Snake, I’m going to need proper facilities, which I’m not sure your ocean hideaway has,” Dr. Clark said, looking around distastefully. 

“We can handle that.  You did this.  You can undo it,” Big Boss insisted.

“And then you’ll let me go?” Dr. Clark asked.

Big Boss _laughed_ at the question.  “Oh no.  I’m not letting you leave and commit whatever war crimes you might have in store.  You’re going to fix what you did to the boys.  And then we’ll figure out what to do with you next.”

“You’re one to talk about war crimes,” the doctor scoffed.  “You’re probably going to raise those boys to be child soldiers.”

“No!” Big Boss growled.  “If they want to be involved, they’ll make that decision for themselves, when they’re old enough to know what that means.”

An image of Paz with her head shaved and big, jagged, angry stitches across her abdomen flashed through Big Boss’s mind.  An image of her throwing herself from the plane, taking Chico with her, before the explosion took them both.  And he released a breath slowly.  Then he focused a steely gaze on Paramedic

“You know, it’s taken me this long, but I finally figured it out,” he said after a moment. 

“What did you figure out?” Dr. Clark asked, warily, surprised at the change in subject.

“I figured out that the point of men like me, the point of MSF, is to make sure that men like me aren’t needed anymore.  MSF will always be a home for soldiers that might not have anywhere else to go.  But if they want a future outside of this, maybe this can help them work towards that.  I think that’s what the Boss would have wanted,” he said.   “But before that, I just want to make sure that my kids have a future.  And, unfortunately, you’re the only one that can do that.”

Dr. Clark _stared_ at him for a few long moments.  She didn’t know what she had expected from Big Boss, but _that_ explanation certainly wasn’t it.  She was temporarily at a loss for words.  Of course, that’s when Ocelot decided to give his opinion on the matter.

“You know, Boss, there are _ways_ of making her cooperate,” Ocelot said, and Big Boss had to admit he didn’t like the smile on Ocelot’s face.

“Ways?” This came from Dr. Clark, who repeated the word warily.

“I’ll have you know, I’m a torture specialist,” Ocelot said.  “I can be very… persuasive.”

“No, Ocelot.  We’ll figure something else out,” he said.  Torture didn’t solve anything in his experience.

Dr. Clark seemed to relax fractionally at that.  Maybe Big Boss wasn’t as crazy as everyone was making him out to be these days.  Which was a good thing.

Kaz snapped off the video about then.  He’d heard enough.

“Hey!” Eli protested.

David was more thoughtful, considering something.  “Uncle Kaz?  What did Dr. Clark do to us?  Dad said that we had to go get her because he didn’t want us to get sick.”

“He was talking about us like we were broken TVs,” Eli said.

Kaz sighed.  “From everything I know, it has to do with how you two were made.”

“We already know where babies come from, Uncle Kaz,” David said.

Kaz sighed.  “That’s not what I meant,” he said, though he wasn’t going to ask how they had come about _that_ particular piece of knowledge. 

“Why does he want her to fix us?  We’re not broken,” Eli said.

“It’s… something that was done before you two were born.  Your dad told you that you two could get really sick, right?” Kaz asked.  He was trying to figure out how to explain this whole thing to the twins.  Thanks for nothing, Boss.

“Yeah.  But we aren’t sick.  Dad said that we had to kidnap Dr. Clark to make sure we didn’t get sick,” David said, frowning

“He’s right.  And from what Ocelot told us, this sickness is set to turn on once you two hit a certain age.  But we don’t know when that will be.  So, Boss went to go get Dr. Clark so that she can undo even the chance of you guys getting sick,” Kaz explained.

 David and Eli were quiet for a few moments.  Which, in Kaz’s experience, never boded well.  Usually, the only time the Twins were quiet for sustained periods of time was when they were eating or sleeping. 

“What if we go talk to her?” David asked.

“Yeah!” Eli agreed.  “She won’t talk to Dad, and the cowboy wants to be a jerk.  Let us talk to her!”

“You two, I don’t think—” but that was as far as Kaz got, because the twins took off towards the briefing room.  He thought about going after them, but decided that turning on the monitors again might be a better use of his time.  It looked like they were going to see if Dr. Clark had a heart after all.

The twins got into the briefing room with relatively little difficulty.  Of course, their entrance caused all eyes on the room to turn to them.

“What are you two doing in here?” Big Boss asked.

“We came to talk to the doctor,” David said, leveling his gaze on Dr. Clark.

“Yeah.  We figured we could talk her into making it so we don’t get sick,” Eli said.

Dr. Clark looked at the two, at something of a loss.  “I…”

“If you make it so we don’t get sick, we’ll make it so our Dad lets you go,” David said.

“Now wait a minute, David—”

“Dad, what good will it be to keep her here?  We already have a lot of good doctors in MSF,” Eli said.  “Besides, if she fixes us, isn’t that good enough?”

“So?  What do you say?” David asked, his arms crossed as he glared at Dr. Clark.

She was honestly at a loss.  It was one thing to work on a project years ago.  It was another to come face to face with the fruits of her labor.   And it was clear that Big Boss wasn’t just going to give the twins _back_ to the government.  So, the genetic timer that she’d built into them seemed both pointless and cruel now.

“I’ll do what I can,” Dr. Clark finally said.  “But like I told Big Boss, I’ll need proper facilities.  And this will take time.   And it may take multiple treatments to make sure it takes.”

“You tell us what you need.  We’ll make it happen,” Big Boss said.  “And then we’ll consider the whole thing finished.”

“Well then.  Pay attention.  It’s going to be a rather long list,” she said, watching as the twins settled at the table in the room. 

The matter didn’t seem quite resolved, but it seemed well on its way there.  And if the twins seemed to have Big Boss as wrapped around their fingers as it seemed, maybe she would even get to go home at the end of all of this.  But those thoughts could wait.  There was a lot to organize, and as strange as it was, she had a couple of little boys that she needed to make well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't forget about this fic! Life is just what happens when you're busy making other plans. I think I'm going to call this fic a wrap with this chapter. But I still have more ideas for the weird grandpa big boss universe. We'll get to those in time.


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